twodinks.com

So the Republicans have decided a great way to solve the budget crisis is to completely defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a federal program that provides funding to NPR and PBS. I signed a petition asking them to stop messing with a popular use of public funds (unless you’re a wingnut, apparently). Here’s his office’s canned reply:

Thank you for contacting me to express your views on federal funding for public broadcasting.  It is good to hear from you.

You raised some interesting and insightful points regarding federal funds for services like National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), and I appreciate you sharing them with me.  You may be interested to know that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which provides a small percentage of funding for NPR and PBS, has received $4 billion in taxpayer funding since 2001, including $430 million in FY 2011.  It is important to keep in mind that reductions to CPB do not necessarily bring an end to quality public programming, because over 80 percent of U.S. public broadcasting funding comes from non-federal sources.  Popular public programs can continue without federal taxpayer dollars through the support of and contributions from commercial and charitable funding.

I believe the current federal debt is among the most serious problems facing this and future generations.  This historic failure to control spending directly affects our economy and the ability to create jobs.  It pushes up interest rates and crowds out private investment.  To address this challenge, we must make the difficult decisions to prioritize how taxpayer dollars are spent.

Thank you again for taking the time to write.  I will keep your views in mind as Congress continues to explore ways to address our budget deficits and reduce our debt. I encourage you to visit my website at www.portman.senate.gov. Please keep in touch.

Naturally, I agree that the federal debt is a huge problem. But the way he presented his math pissed me off. He tries to make it look “bad” by opening with the $4 billion figure. Sounds like a lot of money, wow! Oh, wait. That’s over the past DECADE. His contention that the shortfall can be covered by support from…well, here’s my reply to him:

According to a canned message I received from your office, “the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which provides a small percentage of funding for NPR and PBS, has received $4 billion in taxpayer funding since 2001, including $430 million in FY 2011.” Considering non-security discretionary was slated to be around $496 billon, I can’t agree with the claim that you and your party are being responsible by aggressively cutting a program that equals less than 1% of that part of the budget. I also don’t see how 10-20% of a local station’s budget can be considered a small percentage of funding.

Claiming that their budget shortfalls “can continue without federal taxpayer dollars through the support of and contributions from commercial and charitable funding” as was claimed in your email is quite false. I know that’s the Republican reason for cutting most programs that benefit people instead of corporations or the super-rich. The problem with that contention is that there is only so much charitable money to be spread around. As more programs, services, and safety nets are cut, do you truly believe that those already overburdened private funds are going to be able to make up the difference?

It’s never a good idea to spend more than you take in. Bush’s tax cuts were a bad idea a decade ago, as were his unfunded mandates. Your party was completely in step with these decisions, and even fought to keep those cuts in place against all logic and reason. What your party is proposing now would be like me turning down a raise at work, complaining that I can’t make ends meet, and deciding that my best move would be to cut my toothpaste budget while continuing to make payments on my 7-series.

I’d like to propose that you cut that minuscule $430 million from the already bloated and skyrocketing military budget? Since their budget approaches $1 TRILLION dollars, CPB funding amounts to nothing more than a rounding error to them. And if we do that, we’ll still be spending more than the next 15 countries *combined*. That’s so irresponsible it’s ludicrous. If your party does not agree to sizable yet sensible cuts to the defense budget, or at least a road map to such, you’re not at all serious about balancing the budget unless it means only cutting the programs your side doesn’t like. It would be nice if, for once, someone stood up and admitted this.

Ah, intellectual dishonesty. It’s alive and well and bipartisan in the nation’s capitol.

// register the new sidebar; this will hold a WP custom menu widget, give it a logical name
register_sidebars(1,array(‘name’ => ‘Members-Only Menu’,
‘before_widget’ => ‘<li id=”%1$s”>’,
‘after_widget’ => ‘</li>’,
‘before_title’ => ‘<h3>’,
‘after_title’ => ‘</h3>’
)
);

// create function to display widget
// this menu is limited to user levels above “subscriber”
function widgetized() {
if (current_user_can(‘level_1′)){ ?>
<div id=”membermenu”>
<ul>
<?php thesis_default_widget(5); ?>
</ul>
</div>
<?php }
}

// i put the member-exclusive menu above the header, basically the first thing on the page
add_action(‘thesis_hook_before_header’, ‘widgetized’, ’1′);

/* user level key
Administrator: level_10
Editor: level_7
Author: level_2
Contributor: level_1
Subscriber: level_0 (you wouldn’t use this as you’d just use the is_user_logged_in() function)
*/

Here’s another way to link to stylesheets. It may be overkill for some things, but definitely useful for plugin developers. I’m thinking of sending the link to every plugin author who echoes 50 lines of CSS into my page headers. Thanks alot.